been there for years. >> bob: he's greek. >> andrea: so what? i don't care -- >> bob: you're sympathetic. >> greg: there is a gold bookstore near me that is closing soon. my life is over. >> eric: that's five five. thank you for watching. >> bret: good evening. i'm bret baier. this is "special report." we're live tonight in jasper county, iowa, one of the swing counties that will likely determine the winner of the presidential race on election day. a little more than seven weeks from now. 50 days. there are 12 battleground states. we identified more than 30 key swing counties inside the state based on the voting patterns, key issues and demographics. they oar marked in yellow on the map on your screen. this county, jasper, named after a revolutionary war hero is 35 miles east of des moine moines. ranks 18th out of iowa 99 counties in population. both parties vice presidential

nominees are in iowa today. that marks the 26th and 27th visit by the president. the vice president, governor romney, congressman ryan. or their wives. to iowa this year. 27 times. for a state with six electoral votes. here in newton, maytag appliance was the big employer for years about closed up five years ago. with it, many jobs left. this town has union influence but it's increasingly drifting republican. we catch up with folks in iowa we spoke to last summer about what is important now. we will get analysis from the local journalists covering the race. that is later. we begin, though, in the middle east where there is fresh violence against american interest and continueed back and forth about just what triggered it. radical jihaddist is doing their own spinning. leland vittert has that story.

>> reporter: in kabul, afghanistan, rioters burned vehicles outside the u.s. embassy as the police held them back from the compound. in pakistan, police blasted protesters with tear gas and water cannons. pushing them away from the embassy temporarily closed. in beirut, the leader of hezbollah made a public appearance to call for continueed protest as the well-armed militia men chanted back "death to america." the protest started tuesday in cairo where thousands of hardline islamists marched on the embassy. and tore down the stars and stripes, in reaction to amateur youtube clip insulting the prophet muhammad. organizing the crowd was a convicted jihaddist and brother of al-qaeda leader ayman al-zawahiri. today, the younger brother sat down with fox news for exclusive interview about the protest. >> translator: it has nothing to do with the

violence, but insulting the muslims around the world. and prophet muhammad. >> how can you call for a protest about a movie you haven't seen? >> translator: i read about the movie. it's merely the title. it's refused by us. if the egyptian people saw the movie, the protest would explode. >> al-zawahiri was released from egyptian prison this year and is now working to bring about an islamic state in egypt. he says the violence and protest will continue until the makers of the film are punished. >> if you insult the prophet muhammad, you are jailed. >> correct. if they don't repent, we will execute them. >> hezbollah and lebanon and jihaddists here in egypt rarely see eye to eye. one is shia muslim and the other is sunni muslim. the insult to the prophet muhammad could prove to be an explosive combination to ignite extremist on both part

of the muslim faith, which would be dangerous in the already volatile time in the middle east. >> leland vittert live early tuesday in cairo. thank you. >> president obama is dealing not only with new violence aimed at diplomatic outposts but a growing debate about what part if any his policies have played in the up roar. chief white house correspondent ed henry has that part of the story on the cam pape trail tonight from columbus, ohio. >> even as president obama campaigns today in ohio, aides say he is getting regular briefing on violence spreading across the muslim world >> what happened this week underscores we face threats in the world. we can't just pull back. >> the top advisors continue to claim the attack that killed chris siebs and three other americans was not planned out and grew out of protest against anti-muslim film. >> the best information and best assessment we have today,

in fact this was not a preplanned, premeditated attack. what happened initially this was a spontaneous reaction to what had transpired in cairo as a consequence of the video. >> that was quickly contradicted by the interim president of libya who said he believes al-qaeda was involved around foreigners entered libya to carry out the attack tied to the anniversary of 9/11. >> it's clear that well-trained and well-prepared and have planned this. >> top administration officials today insist the libyan president comments do not match consensus within the u.s. intelligence community. though intelligence source on the ground tells fox assault included rocket-propelled grenade and mortar fire. john mccain suggested that the white house is reluctant to admit there was a terror attack. >> it was clearly an act of terror. people don't bring heavy

weapons and rocket propelled grenades to determinations demo. for the united states government to say it's spontaneous act flies in the face of the facts. >> white house officials have been claiming for days the raid was motivated by the anti-muslim film. despite skepticism of the film being that influential on "fox news sunday" and four other sunday news programs ambassador susan rice would not budge. >> we have had evolution of the arab spring in the last many months but what sparked the recent violence was the airing on the internet of a hateful, offenseive video that has offended many people around the world. >> today our own james rosen pressed the state dement spokeswoman where will it was an act of terror and she said the administration will not put a label on it until the investigation is complete. but it's emerging as one of the key questions along with why there wasn't more security in benghazi.

>> bret: ed henry traveling with the president in columbus, ohio. thank you. as i said at the top of the show, iowa is a popular place today. we're here. so are the two men running for vice president. the top of the g.o.p. ticket, however, is in california tonight on outreach of group firmly in his opponent's corper. chief political correspondent carl cameron has that story from los angeles. >> emphasizing more details of the five-point economic plan in contrast to what he says is lack from the president, mitt romney promised the 33rd hispanic chamber of commerce convention in los angeles he would end what he called the obama administration hos silty toward small business. >> national unemployment is 8.1%. hispanic unemployment is over 10%. over 2 million more hispanics are living in post officeerty y than when obama took office. >> he told the business group he would reform immigration policy. unlike the president who promised he would make it a priority. >> the president never offered up a bill.

like so many issues confronting our nation, when it comes to immigration, politics have been put ahead of people for far too long. >> team romney argues re-electing the president means four more years of chaos overseas and domestic decline. paul ripe helped dueling iowa cam pape events. ripe delivered entitlement reform speech to the aarp later this week. >> romney is adding new policy adds and selling details and specifics in the plan more now. >> reducing the federal employment by 10% through attrition, combining agencies and departments, to reduce the overhead, i'm going to send a number of programs that are growing uncontrolably fast back to the states. where i am going to limit the rate of growth to rate of inflation. or in the case of medicaid to inflation plus 1%. >> president obama campaigning in cincinnati said he would reduce the deficit. >> number four.

we're going to reduce our deficit without sticking it to the middle class. i put forward a plan to reduce the deficit by $4 trillion. >> polls suggest the public does know that romney has a plan to right the economy. but they don't know very much about it. voters and republican conservatives have been clamoring to hear more. in the words of one republican romney aide today, "we heard the demand, and we aim to answer it." bret? >> bret: carl cameron live in los angeles tonight. thank you. we will talk to some iowans about what they are thinking 50 days from the election. up next, the electoral college map. who is gaining, who is slipping? with just seven weeks to go. [ male announcer ] introducing a stunning work of technology. introducing the entirely new lexus es. and the first-ever es hybrid.

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>> bret: welcome back to newton, iowa. we are 50 days away from the

presidential election and there is a perception out there that president obama is pulling ahead. in some of the battleground states. let's get insight on the electoral college map from former bush senior advisor rove roe and democratic strategist, joe trippi. first glimpse of the latest map. you can see the info on the key, as we always show you. red, romney state. blue, obama state. pinkish is lean romney, light blue is lean obama. yellow states are tossup states within the margin of error. this is based on polls from the last 30 days. this particular map has polls in the last 30 days. karl, what has changed since we last talked? >> first, we had to wrap the polls last week. largest polls in one week. 41 polls in 20 states. immediate aftermath at the democratic convention. they should reflect the democrat bounce and they do. for the first time we had a week the obama changes in status were bigger than the changes in status benefiting

romney. two states moved from lean obama to obama. minnesota and pennsylvania. one state moved from tossup, michigan, to lean obama. and that was offset by one state, kentucky, which may have moved from lean romney to romney. so we're basically a slight shift toward obama. mostly in the upper midwest. 241 electoral college votes between obama and lean obama states to 191 for romney, between the romney and lean romney states. and eight tossup states with 106 electoral college votes. the immediate aftermath of the democratic convention shows 14 state showed movement toward obama. six states showed movement toward romney. but nonetheless, the immediate aftermath of the democratic convention, democrat bounce. we saw it in these polls. >> bret: joe, the significance there? here in iowa, they are spending a lot t oftime, both come pains. joe biden here today, paul ryan here today.

iowa is a tossup state. >> iowa is gaining importance, bret. one reason is that the math, the electoral map is starting to shrink. with michigan and pennsylvania, i think sort of both campaigns are pulling out a lot of the tv money to move it to other states. those states moving to obama column. the next state i think that is moving is north carolina. which is starting to lean to romney. even with that bounce that karl talked about. that makes me put that sort of in a lean romney situation. if you have most free states doing that, it is putting increase pressure and spending on state like iowa. those electoral votes are really, are now really going to be front and center. >> yeah. absolutely. iowa, we are seeing more per capita spending on television in iowa by the obama campaign than any other state in country. in fact, what is interesting is since june, the television

waiweight in north carolina, obama reduced weight by 40%. iowa, they are buying more television in rochester, minnesota, television than any market in north carolina. even rochester, minnesota, gets four or five counties, thinly populated rural counties on northern edge of iowa. it shows how north carolina is, shifting to the romney column and how much up for grabs iowa is which would s comfortable win four years ago for obama. >> bret: you talk about iowa. six electoral votes. the big prize is ohio. you look at those trend lines, it does not look the best. you are sitting in mitt romney's seat right now. >> you are right. if you look at the real clear politic trend line averaging the polls in ohio, it's really significant that in the last year, for the entire year, romney has never won that average vote. he has never been in lead.

obama held it the entire year. it's getting tight here. not only it puts more pressure on romney campaign to go after ohio, but they have to win, if ohio were to stay in obama's column, then they have to go everywhere else. iowa, new hampshire, florida. they have to win the entire rest of the states that remain tossup at this point. >> i get a ton of e-mails act polls and how they are weighted toward democrats. could you explain to folks the dynamics here for the polling and how it factors in? >> yeah, look. each poll has a different political mat matrix. cbs, "new york times" had three-point lead for obama. 35% democrat. 22% republican. 13-point more democrats than republicans. romney winning the republicans by a bigger martin than obama winning democrats. and romney winning independents and three points

behind. abc/"washington post" had a 1-point lead for obama, 3 # 32 democrats, 26 republicans and 37 independents. rasmussen, one-point lead for romney. 37, 36, 26. how you break out the partisan matrix has a big impact on the outcome of your poll. >> bret: all right. joe, i want to wrap up, because we have an ipad app where folks can put in their own maps, compare them to you and karl. send them to us. we have one today. we want to talk about quickly. >> james peppy did his map, this is interesting because there are 251 electoral votes for obama in his map. february you give obama new mexico, he has tossup, where karl and i replace it right now it's interesting because he has a way for romney to win. i want to -- he sent me this. romney's path is clearer to me. florida, north carolina, virginia, ohio, and either wisconsin or iowa.

iowa still right there front and center in james pepe's map as well. >> bret: karl, last word. >> look, i have a minor disagreement. joe said that romney had to take every other state under the scenario of losing ohio. it's simply not true. he takes colorado and wisconsin, iowa and wisconsin, new hampshire, iowa and colorado, nevada and colorado or iowa and new hampshire. there are 11 other ways to get there if you lose ohio. >> what happened to the three, two, one strategy? >> look, i feel good about ohio, because obama is never above 50%. he is stuck there if the mid-to-the high 40s. he has not been able to put away the state. >> fair enough. >> bret: just because i'm not in the studio doesn't mean i can't control the two of you. i'm in iowa. i can still control it. joe, karl, as always, thank you. see you next week. still ahead, another day off for students and another day of scrambling for parents. chicago teachers strike when

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>> bret: jasper county courthouse in newton, iowa. 300 miles east of here, the fight orve education in chicago moved from the boardroom to the courtroom. the mayor is asking a judge to force teachers back to work, as their strike begins the second week. correspondent steve brown is in chicago tonight. >> it does not sound like the animosity is winding down between striking teachers and the chicago public schools. >> i think the -- [ inaudible ] i was impressed by. he doesn't engage people. around the school closing. >> with the potential contract deal crafted by both sides still on the table, mayor rahm emanuel may have rekindled

hostilities with the teachers union he announced the city attorneys would seek injunction to force teachers back to work immediately. this is after yesterday's vote on whether to the end strike was postponed by the union representatives. at issue is trust. that's why the teachers will not return to school until a deal is done. >> they do not trust that going back will allow them to have to take -- please, write the word "trust" in giant letters. that is what the problem is. >> reporter: a hearing is set for wednesday. rahm emanuel was not available for comment. but it's soured the relationship between him and the union, which is not very good. reminder, there is still a deal on the table. bret? >> we will follow this one. steve brown live in chicago tonight. thank you. wall street broke the four-day

winning streak. the counse dow jones slipped 40. nasdaq and s&p 500 were down five. obama administration is fighting to keep secret name of the seals involved in planning the raid of killing usama bin laden after giving the name to hollywood movie makers. they provided the name to producers in preparation for the upcoming movie "zero dark thirty." now the justice department has gone to court to keep the identities from the public. no grapevine tonight to reintroduce you to some iowanss. we check in with some folks we talked to months ago to find out how they feel right now about the presidential race. ♪ [ male announcer ] you've reached the age where you don't back down from a challenge. this is the age of knowing how to make things happen. sowhy let erectile dysfunction get in your way? talk to your doctor about viagra. 20 million men already have.

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call... to switch, and you could save hundreds. liberty mutual insurance -- responsibility. what's your policy? >> bret: welcome back to newton, iowa. last year we met three iowanss from a few miles from here. we learned what is important to them and what it will take to get their vote in november. tonight, we reconnect. and find out what has changed and what has not. >> hi, guys. how are you? >> shanna jan sevesen is married with two kids. a working mom. >> do you have evegood. >> i did vote for obama in the last election. >> bret: we met her in june 2011 in search of undecided iowa voters. when asked about president obama then, she did not blame

him for the country economic troubles. >> i don't believe that we can say this is all the president. i have never been a person who has attached what is happening in the country to one person. >> six weeks later after campaign ads hit iowa in big numbers, and the grand bargain, the debt deal in washington fell apart. a different tone from shanna, but she still says she was undecided. >> i'm disappointed with where we are at with the country. >> now more than a year later, she says she thinks she has decided. >> i'm still an independent. i think i will forever be an independent. but i am leaping toward -- leaning toward romney at this point in time. >> bret: last time we chatted you said really the deficit and the debt and concerns about your kids really drove your thinking. >> yes. >> still the case? >> yeah. that is still probably the issues that are foremost in my mind and what is leaping me

toward romney. the concern about our national deficit and our increasing debt. and that burden that that would place on my kids. that is the thing i'm most discouraged about four years later. national spending habits are inexcusable and unacceptable. so i think that needs to change. that is why i am looking forward romney at this point in time. >> des moines businessman dade greenspan there is little doubt in mismind he will support the republican candidate. >> [ inaudible ] >> he opens an advertising manufacturing company. competitive edge. when we first met him 15 months ago he was worried about his company's essential. edge. >> government regulations are more and more pervasive and we have had more involvement with things we never thought we'd have to know about.

lawyers. patent attorneys. >> six weeks later before the iowa straw poll he shunt sure who to pick. >> i do like tim pawlenty. i like mitt romney and i like herman cain. mitt romney has a tremendous business background. >> a year later, david said he is convinced his instincts about romney were right and that business experience will lead him to the white house. >> leadership is the key and he is a strong leader for the country. >> even else we talked to in iowa, david sees the unrest in middle east and north africa factoring in the election, his decision and the decision of other businessmen, many of whom look at the world through the prism of stability, trade, the price of oil. and what it all means to business and the health of the u.s. economy. >> i think the world is less

safe. i see, i see an awful lot that makes me uncomfortable about the future of the country with the economy. i think we are going to be gearing up, i hope for stronger military. common sense, you know, we're down to earth. we take the issues very seriously. >> iowa farmer has had a family farm here for 35 years. he has one message to whoever is president next year. >> stop regulating us to death. because it's going to hurt us long-term. >> a message he delivered to us when we met him on the farm in june of 2011. >> those of us in the industry have regulated ourselves, because the last thing we want to do is ruin the land that we're, that we survive on. >> and six weeks later. >> when we look at today, the message that we want to send back to washington is leigh me alone. >> today, bill is really sick and tired of iowa getting as much attention as it's

getting. >> we wish that the ads would go away. you know, we can make our own choices today without people bashing each other on television. and we look at the dollars being spent. we just feel that it is out of place. look what we could do with dollars in other places of the country or the world. >> bret: a common theme here, our thoughts to shanna, david and bill. we may be back. now to another influential voting bloc, hispanics. we told you earlier that romney spoke to a group a short time ago in california. bill hemmer report that the republicans have major work to do. >> president barack obama and vice president joe biden hold a 30-point lead over challenger mitt romney and congressman paul ryan among latino likely voters according to a just released fox news latino poll. obama 60% latino support is less than the 67% he received in the 2008 exit polls.

but the new polls suggest undecided latinos will break his way. >> i would vote for obama. >> latino voters are far more likely to approve of the job that president obama is doing compared to the nation at large. 65% of latino voters approve of the job that the president is doing. compare it to 50% of the population at large in the latest fox news poll. >> inition, more latino voters are satisfied than not with the way things are going in the country. the opposite is true for all voters. latinos are more optimistic about the future. consider this. >> less than half of all voters think life will be better for americans in the future, three-quarters of latino thought the next generation of latinos would have a better life than today. 88% say their family either has or will achieve the american dream. >> romney does beat obama among latino with household incomes over $100,000. they go for romney 49 to 44%.

he also does better among cuban americans who prefer him over obama 46 to 39%. back to you, bret. >> bret: bill, thank you. the fighting in the middle east. what really started it? radical elements, are they really rioting over the video? or is it far deeper than that? we will ask the fox all-stars in washington when we come back. ♪ ♪ [ male announcer ] introducing a reason...to look twice. introducing a stunning work of technology -- the entirely new lexus es. and the first-ever es hybrid. this is the pursuit of perfection.

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over 73 percent who reviewed 5-hour energy said they would recommend a low calorie energy supplement to their healthy patients who use energy supplements. seventy-three percent. 5-hour energy has four calories and it's used over nine million times a week. is 5-hour energy right for you? ask your doctor. we already asked 3,000. this was not a preplanned, premeditated attack. what happened initially it was a spontaneous reaction to what transpired in cairo, as a consequence of the video. they spun from there to something much, much more violent. >> the way that that kind of weapons whey used -- [ inaudible ] well trained. well prepared.

anand response. >> you don't regard it as act of terrorism? >> i don't think we know enough. we'll continue to assess. >> bret: spokesperson today answering questions from james rosen after the u.s. ambassador to united nations susan rice answering over the weekend that it's all tied to that anti-islam video. what about all of this? bring in panel from washington. fred barns, executive editor of the stand stand. kirsten powers for daily beast. syndicated columnist charles krauthammer. it was an interesting weekend listening to all the statements. your thoughts? >> i was embarrassed. it's embarrassing to hear susan rice and jay carney the white house press secretary before claim that somehow it was only this 13-minute video or 14 minutes that most people in middle east haven't even seen, but that is why they are out attacking the american consulate in benghazi and storming the embassy in cairo.

now american embassies out to indonesia which has a moderate form of islam. obviously, that is not true. who are you going to believe in susan rice or the president of libya? for heaven's sake. he has been there, she hasn't. there is obviously something else going on here. and the weak response of the obama administration doesn't help where we act like it's just that video and some miles per hour who has been offensive toward people who live in islamic countrys. all that can do is we know from the earlier incidents like all the hooray about the danish cartoon and the book with the satanic verses and -- all this does incite further attack and further anti-americanism. we'll see more from this. one other thing, look, this represents the collapse of the obama sweet talk policy toward

islam and toward islamic countrys. it hasn't worked. simple as that. it hasn't worked. he needs to try strength in the foreign policy. not weakness. >> bret: what is the motivation for the statement if we are kind of learning a little bit more and more about the benghazi attack every day? there are some reports that the protest subsided at one point and then the attack happened. we're getting more and more from the ground. >> yeah. i think the purpose of it from the side of the administration is obviously to just try to put a period at end of the sentence and move on. and they want to portray this as it was just some spontaneous attack that happened even though a lot of the statements that secretary rice frankly made don't add up. it was reported that people outside the consulate said it was quiet prior to the attack. yet, she is saying there was an uprising already taking place and then the extremists joined it. and the libyans government

says they arrested people that were tied to al-qaeda. that is a bad story. obviously, for the administration, who what been dancing on usama bin laden's grave for about a week, then to have the story come back and have a story about al-qaeda is attacking one of the embassies. i think they are trying to make the story go away but they are putting out information that doesn't add up. >> bret: charles, there is a pew research center poll new one out about global attitude. it's interesting. it puts up the unfavorable stat from jordan, pakistan and egypt. there you see them. 2009 to 2012. each one of those countrys increasing the unfavorable thought among population of the u.s. in egypt, up to 79% now. your thoughts on the big picture about the middle east and north africa? >> the poll also had a survey of the major arab countries public opinion in them on u.s. policy.

which remember, obama that he did change radically after he became president. it turns out when the bush administration, the revileed bush administration left office, support for them in these muslim countries was 35%. today, it's 15%. more than 50% drop in support. what you are getting there is sort of the moderate angle of this where we saw the extreme element reacting in their own way with american interest, embassies ablaze from north africa, all the way to south asia. the reason the administration is hanging on to this preposterous explanation it's all about the film that may not even exist is because they can't face the larmer fact that this is an expression, both in the polls, and in the riot a demonstration of the collapse of obama's cairo

doctrine. speech he made the 4th of june 2009 where he proclaimed new condition with islam, accommodating and all up like to warmongering, brutal, torturing obama administratiotorturing bush adm. it would be accommodating, soft on syria, return of the ambassador hillary clinton saying that assad is a reformer. distancing from israel, withdrawal from iraq. all of these were premiseed on the thought that if we only were more accommodating with the muslim world we would be popular and we would have respect and affection again. that is now inflamed, so they have to pretend it's all about a video. >> bret: 30 seconds, fred. does this turn politically for mitt romney after all of the focus by much of the main stream media on the official statement about this incident? >> well, i thought the

statement was correct then. the ball is in his court. it's up to him. he has an opportunity to now take a strong stand on foreign policy. this is a test of his leadership. and we'll see what happens. there is plenty of time left in alisyn camerot the campaign a small stand. >> bret: 20 seconds. >> 26% of people approved of the romney state in the the poll today. that doesn't look great for him. he is not stepping in to this and he is not acting with real estate is not following through on the initial criticisms unless he does something and offers an a earntive, it won't help him -- alternative, it won't help him. >> bret: as always, thank you. next up, journalists here in iowa on the presidential race.

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>> bret: welcome back to newton, iowa. we're in uncle nancy coffee house and eatery. we want to welcome in the local panel of experts to get local perspective on the state of iowa and the presidential race. kay hender sob, news director of radio iowa. bob eshewan from news. and jennifer, register. thank you for being here. bob, here in newton, in jasper county this is a place where this is a swing county. 9 # counties in iowa. to 20 are reliable republican. 27 said to be reliable democratic. 52 swing counties. jasper county is one of those. why is it that way? what is the big issue here? >> jobs and the economy are the big issues. we have polled the readers with the "newton daily news" and that was the number one issue for 46% of our readers.

obviously with the maytag departure were concerned about finding good jobs again. >> bret: maytag was a big part of the community and left in 2007 finally after pulling out, starting a pull-out over years. a big union place. and now, jobs are the big issue. >> exactly. we have had a good -- done a good job of economic development retaping some of those jobs but -- retaining some of those jobs but they don't pay as well. so there is the concern about things such as the production tax credit for wind energy, because we do have two companies that are major employers that benefit directly from that. >> bret: maybe that is why we are hearing the president and his team talk about that again and again, jennifer. it's amazing to see how much time each campaign and the

candidates and the vice president and paul ripe have spent in this state. six electoral votes. numbers are staggering. >> eight visits by obama so far this year. six trips by romney this year. if you combine obama and the vice president and the first lady and the second lady it's 18 trips so far this year. with paul ryan and -- sorry, mitt romney and his people, it's nine trips this year. they are definitely trying to send a message to iowanss that they are important. >> bret: why do you think that is? >> it's a couple of things. there are very few states in the nation that are gettable right now. that is the biggest reason. there are so few tossup states. this has potential for either side. both sides have a path to winning here. obama made it clear he has a soft spot to iowa. that this is a state that launched him. he feels deep affection for iowa and he is a competitive guy and he doesn't want to lose the state that gave him his first chance. >> bret: you will be polling soon.

>> we will be. >> bret: we won't give details away. what is your sense to how this is backing up here in iowa? really can't get a sense of polls. there haven't been a lot of them. but you get a sense about talking to people. where do you think the state is? >> i think it's split down the middle. it reminds me a lot of 2004. and even 2000. when this state was decided by just a few thousand votes. in the general election. when you talk to people, democrats are really in their corner. and republicans are really in their corner. i think the key for both of these campaigns will be figuring out how to crack independents that maybe lean republican or lean democrat. jasper county is an interesting case and point for that. because jasper county is about 26 miles away from the center of des moines. a lot of people who live here commute. it becomes a suburban o'say analysis for people who don't want to live in the big city if you will and raise their

children in rural america. so those are voters that both campaigns are competing heavily for. >> bret: bob, unemployment here is 6.7%. under the national level. but above the state of 5.3%. interestingly, you pointed to your polling over a month and said the deficit and debt still plays high with people here. >> when we polled the readers we asked them in groups of four specific what they wanted to focus on when they went to the booth in november. and we had jobs in the economy as number one national debt. and the national spending is number two. they were both in the 40s. so those are probably the two primary things that people are thinking about here as they go to the polls. am i going to get a job?

am i going to keep a job? >> bret: jennifer, spending on ads, in iowa you can't turn on the television without seeing an ad. some television stations and i'm sure radio, it's just demanding. >> it is. one thing i want to talk about what bob was saying one reason that obama numbers are soft in iowa, you have swing voters who in general think that obama didn't live up to the hype. they think that, they are not excited to vote for him this time. you have a lot of swing voters in iowa who are maybe, they dept think that romney made the case strongly enough yet why he is better than obama so swing voters are saying they are ready to fire the president but not ready to hire romney. stalemate. the ads are overwhelming. it's everywhere. >> bret: come down to the wire? >> it could indeed. one of the aftereffects of the advertising here is that the congressional race in iowa, four of them have become very

competitive. obviously, reapportionment year so candidates introduce themselves to new people but there has been some effect in making the democrat go democrat and republicans go home. >> thank you so much. very interesting. we'll be back from newton, iowa, after the short break. . welcome aboard!

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>> bret: finally tonight, some good news, congratulations are in order back in washington for the national zoo's giant pandas. scientists had all but given up hope after years of failed pregnancies, but sunday night, momma may zong gave birth. the zoo has a panda cam that offers a glimpse inside the cage. we have yet to see the new baby. the u.s. government made no secret about plans to deport the furry hinds of washington's furry couple because of their seeming